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Bonnie said: “It was becoming increasingly busy. It was getting worse really. It was like a Bank Holiday weekend every day.

“We are only really meant to move for essential reasons but it was just too much down there in the end.”

Bonnie is concerned that houseboat residents are unable to keep safe distances from large numbers of people passing on the narrow sections of towpath.

She said: “At certain points the towpath is very close to our boats which makes it very difficult for us to get away from this stressful situation.

“The Canal and River Trust have put up signs to limit your use of the towpath but people are blatantly ignoring them.

“It is obvious they are not all locals as the lay by near us has been full of cars."

(Image: Signs erected by the Canal and River Trust. Photo: Paul Gillis)

“The worse culprits are cyclists using the towpath as a velodrome," she continued.

“The police have informed us it’s flowing traffic so permitted, despite the fact the conditions are similar to a towpath equivalent to the M4!”

Bonnie has managed to find a new spot with more grass between her boat and the towpath in Trowbridge.

But clearly this is not possible for all boaters.

(Image: Bonnie Wood claims cyclists use the path as a velodrome)

Confrontations between boaters and walkers

Before the Canal and River Trust put up signs advising people to limit their use of the towpath the general public “just weren’t’ aware” of the problem, one boater who wished to remain anonymous told us.

He said: “Boaters would say ‘stay away from me’ – but walkers were saying ‘well no-one said we couldn’t be here’.”

His houseboat is in Bathampton which has more room than some other stretches of the towpath and in his opinion the situation has improved since he first got in touch with us to help publicise the Canal and River Trust’s guidance.

(Image: New relaxed rules are concerning for live-on-board boat owners)

He said: “At that time there were crazy numbers out there making it impossible to socially distance on some of the very narrow stretches. Luckily common sense has now mostly prevailed.

“It does still get incredibly busy at times, especially with the recent good weather.”

He says there has still been a lot of face to face confrontation between boaters and the public using the path.

(Image: The path is very narrow in stretches. Photo: Paul Gillis)

He said: “The boating community is a lovely group, but like any community there are a lot of people out here with mental health problems and some of them have very short fuses so there is a lot of conflicts.

“One of the things people are most upset about is cyclists – they don’t seem to be aware that pedestrians have priority.

“People use it as a race track. They use it to try to set a record between Bath and Bradford-on-Avon.

“I had one of them brush up against me in the last two days.

“Of course they are all huffing and panting and heaving leaving it in the air around them – that worries people a lot.